“What vitamin do we find in carrots?” Karolina Otto asks the Grade 2 group crowding around her in the produce section.

Multiple hands from the class — all students from Oakville’s John Knox Christian School — shoot up to answer the Real Canadian Superstore’s in-house dietician. “Vitamin A,” several chime.

“That’s right,” Otto replies. “Who knows what Vitamin A does for your body?”

Several of the enthusiastic participants know carrots help eyesight. The eagerness doesn’t wane as Otto leads the class through the grains, meat, dairy and cereal aisles. Her non-stop stream of questions and information on the hour-long tour keep the kids engaged. She shows how they can use their hands to measure appropriate serving sizes.

A close-up look at a live lobster is the day’s runaway hit.

This class is one of about 300 groups in Ontario that have taken part in
Real Food Trips
since the initiative launched in September.

The project was born when Hellmann’s Canada partnered with Loblaws, Real Canadian Superstore and Zehrs Markets locations. It’s geared at children in Kindergarten to Grade 8.

The program is part of the
Hellmann’s Real Food Movement
to help students embrace healthy food and eating habits. The guided, hands-on trips are meant to complement the local curriculum and fill a learning gap by providing out-of-the-classroom experiences, without the burden of cost.

The 300 field trips offered this fall were quickly booked.

Teacher Betty Panza says she jumped at the opportunity as soon as she heard about the free trips (schools arrange transportation). “Last year we studied all the vitamins, which are good for our bodies and what kind of foods you can find them in,” she says.

Nutrition is an ongoing part of the curriculum. “It became an important part of our day, looking at the foods we were eating,” Panza says.

The message gets through, she adds. “The parents have said they’re not allowed to put certain foods in the lunch anymore,” she says, and then laughs.

Still, some reminding is helpful, says student Trinity Chung, 7, at the tour’s end. “I learned which foods have vitamins in it, because I forgot it from last year,” she says. “It was good to learn about a lot of new things that I didn’t know. I don’t like white rice. I like brown rice (now).”

Otto, who has been a dietitian for 20 years, was hired at the Oakville Superstore two years ago. These class trips are a highlight of the job, she says.

“It’s such a fun way of educating about nutrition and it’s such a practical way,” Otto says. “So many children go with their parents to the grocery store, but they’re there to be quiet and mindful throughout the experience and they don’t have time to experiment or explore. This gives them the opportunity to ask questions, to touch, to smell, to feel and to taste.”

Otto speaks with teachers before the trips, and then she can tailor the tours to the students’ age and what they’re studying. When there’s extra time, she’ll incorporate a scavenger hunt of items found on the store’s shelves.

The program is facilitated by
Field Trip Factory
. The U.S.-based company aims to get children familiar with their community, says Michelle Martin, Canadian manager for the company.

The key is getting kids out of the classroom. “In school you’re taught things in a different way,” Martin says. “You’re sitting there, perhaps reviewing Canada’s Food Guide, and it’s not the same as actually seeing it, touching it, listening to a nutritionist tell the story.

Winding down the tour in the cereal aisle, Otto explains the store’s Guiding Stars program, which rates products on a scale of 0 to 3, with 3 being the healthiest choice. Several kids hang back looking for items with the high ratings, as the group makes its way to the front of the store, where a snack of hummus, multi-grain pita and baby carrots awaits.

This trip has changed at least one student’s view of grocery shopping. “Whenever we’d go shopping I was like ‘Why do I have to come?’ ” Trinity says. “Now it’s ‘Can I come?’”

Correction - December 10, 2013: This article was edited from a previous version that mistakenly said that Real Food Trips has been renewed for January in Ontario and will spread to the Atlantic provinces and Quebec.

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